New story in Health from Time: Coronavirus Containment Efforts in the U.S. Could Disrupt ‘People’s Day-to-Day Lives,’ CDC Warns

As the number of people infected with a novel coronavirus known as COVID-19 has ticked up worldwide—totaling more than 80,000 as of Tuesday afternoon—the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has routinely emphasized that the risk to Americans remains relatively low.

But that tone changed somewhat during a call with reporters Tuesday, when Dr. Nancy Messonnier, Director of the CDC’s National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases warned that community spread appears imminent, and disruption to U.S. communities could be significant.

“It is not a question of if coronavirus will spread through the United States,” Messonnier said, “but a question of when and how many people will have severe illness.”

So far, person-to-person spread of COVID-19 has been minimal in the U.S. Most confirmed cases have been among Americans who traveled to areas where COVID-19 is more widespread, and these people have been treated and isolated accordingly. That’s crucial to the containment of disease, as spread within communities greatly increases the total number of cases and the likelihood that transmission will multiply.

Messonnier said the growing number of countries that have seen the virus pass from person to person in significant numbers is worrying, and something the U.S. should consider.

“I’m concerned about the situation. CDC is concerned about the situation,” Messonnier said, adding that now is the time for businesses, hospitals, schools and families to start preparing for a potential domestic outbreak.

On the call, Messonnier laid out steps communities and individuals may have to take if person-to-person spread picks up, including school and workplace closures; voluntary home quarantines; postponing or canceling mass gatherings; and implementing surface cleaning measures in schools, homes and public places. Depending on the extent to which these measures become necessary, schools and businesses may have to conduct classes and work over the phone or internet platforms, she said. Hospitals may have to ask patients to delay elective procedures and conduct other appointments using telemedicine.

While these steps have not yet been taken, even noting their possibility is a marked escalation from some of the CDC’s prior advice on coronavirus containment, which has mostly been limited to frequent hand-washing and covering coughs and sneezes.

“We recognize that implementing [measures] at this level will be disruptive to people’s day-to-day lives” if they become necessary, Messonnier said, noting possibilities such as lost income and the need for alternate childcare arrangements. “We want to prepare people for that possibility.”

Messonnier also raised another concern on the call, noting that there could be shortages of supplies like protective gear for health care workers in the event of a pandemic. Overseas, many Asian countries affected by COVID-19 have run short of supplies like face masks.

Despite the gravity of her advice, Messonnier emphasized that the CDC routinely plans for pandemic situations, in the hopes of over-preparing for a situation that turns out to be of no great risk. “I don’t think that preparedness will ever go to waste,” she told reporters.

New story in Health from Time: Here’s How Quickly Coronavirus Is Spreading in Your State

The novel coronavirus pandemic is a global crisis, a national emergency and a local nightmare. But while a great deal of the focus in the U.S. has been on the federal government’s response, widely criticized as slow and halting , the picture on the ground remains very different in different parts of the country. A TIME analysis of the per capita spread of the epidemic in all 50 states and Washington, D.C. found considerable range in the rate of contagion, and, in some parts of the country, a significant disparity compared to the national figure. The U.S., unlike nations such as South Korea and now Italy , has yet to show signs of bringing the runaway spread of the virus under control. However, while no single state is yet showing strong signs of bending the curve , some are faring much worse than others. The following graphic plots the rise in the total confirmed cases of COVID-19 per 100,000 residents in each state, plotted by the day that each state reported its first case.

New story in Health from Time: We Need to Take Care of the Growing Number of Long-term COVID-19 Patients

On July 7, 2020, the Boston Red Sox pitcher Eduardo Rodriguez tested positive for the new coronavirus. He was scheduled to start Opening Day for the Sox, but the virus had other plans— damaging Rodriguez’s heart and causing a condition called myocarditis (inflammation of the heart muscle). Now the previously fit 27-year old ace left-hander must sit out the 2020 season to recover. Rodriguez is not alone in having heart damage from SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19. In a new study done in Germany, researchers studied the hearts of 100 patients who had recently recovered from COVID-19. The findings were alarming: 78 patients had heart abnormalities, as shown by a special kind of imaging test that shows the heart’s structure (a cardiac MRI), and 60 had myocarditis. These patients were mostly young and previously healthy . Several had just returned from ski trips. While other studies have shown a lower rate of heart problems—for example, a study of 416 patients hosp

New story in Health from Time: What We Don’t Know About COVID-19 Can Hurt Us

Countries around the world have introduced stringent control measures to stop COVID-19 outbreaks growing, but now many find themselves facing the same situation again. From Melbourne to Miami, the relaxation of measures had led to increasing flare-ups, which in some places has already meant reclosing schools, businesses or travel routes. Within the U.S. and among different countries , places with wildly varying public-health policies have experienced wildly diverse outcomes. Most ominously, infections are rising rapidly in many places where they once were falling. So how do countries avoid an indefinite, unsustainable, cycle of opening and closing society? What is needed to prevent a future of strict social distancing and closed borders? To escape this limbo, we need to know more about each step in the chain of infection: why some people are more susceptible or have more symptoms, how our interactions and surroundings influence risk, and how we can curb the impact of the re

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